A quick medical update

 Late last March, I had a severe hand injury which required extensive surgery to repair.  Now, in around mid August, I've recovered sufficiently that I can once again make my ceramic art pieces again.  

If you are a gallery, I'll be back on IndieMe within a few days.  If you are a collector (or just like my work), I'm going to start listing many of my pieces here, and you can contact me to purchase them.  I know there are better ways to sell my artwork online, but this is what I have time to do now.  I also will be listing pieces on Etsy.  Of course, you can also go to any of the galleries who sell my work as well.  When I become  a bit more organized (who knows when that will be!), I will create a list here of galleries who sell my artwork so you can go see it in person if you are in any of their areas.

Making Lots of Ceramic Animal Sculptures

 I've been getting a lot of orders for my large (to me) ceramic animal sculptures lately, and it's been quite a tough go, but I'm getting through them slowly.  

Generally, I can work at a pretty good pace and get a couple done a week, but now, due to a recent hand injury, I'm moving much, much more slowly.  I am a right-handed person generally, but when I sculpt, for some reason, my left hand is dominant.  Unfortunately, the flexor tendon for my thumb in my left wrist just snapped recently, and now I cannot bend my left thumb.  I had no idea how vexing and how incapacitating such an injury could be.  And, unfortunately, because I live in a small town, I guess, the medical community are dragging their feet getting me set up for surgery.  In the meantime, I'm trying my best to get these sculptures done, albeit slowly, because after the surgery, I won't be able to use my left hand for at least a couple of months.  

I have a few that I had already completed before the injury, and I'll post photos of them in a day or two.  Some of the ones I'm building now, I'll show them in their in-progress stages.

A few paintings I've finished over the past year:

 I've been promising to post a few of the paintings I've done this past year, and here are a few for now:  

This is one I did for my granddaughter.  He's her horse, and his name is Val (short for Valentino because he came into her life on Valentine's Day).  He's about as goofy as he appears to be in the painting but really a very, very sweet horse.  Obviously, the original painting is not for sale.

This is a custom painting of a really beautiful dog named Ruby that I painted recently.    Her mom loved the painting, and I enjoyed painting her.

This is a painting of Cooper that I did for a very long-time customer.  He's an Australian labradoodle.  Again, it was a pleasure to paint him, and I'm so happy that his parents loved the painting.

And finally, this is another custom painting named --- I'm sorry!  I'm drawing a blank.  It'll come to me later.  She's obviously a golden retriever and she loves her little blue guy.  I really enjoyed painting her -- and her little blue toy, too.

This is all for now.  I'll add some more later on.  But now work calls again, so I better get back to it.

  

CUSTOM PET PAINTINGS

I have begun taking a limited number of custom pet paintings on stretched canvas, your choice of either oil or acrylic.  See the link to the right for more information. 

Still Working

It's been quite a difficult year for me, but I continue to work, at both my ceramic art and paintings. My daughter and her family live next door to my husband and me. Due to the coronavirus, we are unable to visit each other except outdoors and with masks. It has been a hardship, especially for us "seniors." We haven't left the house in over six months now, pretty tough. Fortunately, I am an artist, he a craftsperson/artist, and for some unexplicable reason, our artworks have been in great demand this past year, which kept us both really busy and able to keep the sadness/loneliness, etc. somewhat at bay as we see our family members go about their lives just next door without many restrictions. But I am getting a bit burned out on my ceramic artwork and have stopped taking wholesale orders from galleries -- except for one gallery who only wants my large one-of-a-kind sculptures. As I often do when I tire from one of my two areas of artwork, I am now doing less in the ceramic side of my business and spending more time painting again. Thus, I've begun taking commissions for custom paintings. Just drop me a message at my email address if you're interested. I've re-published my "How to Commission a Painting" page, so it can give you details on prices, etc. The number of paintings I will take is limited because, unfortunately, I am a meticulous, thus slow, painter and don't want to take on more than I'm comfortable with. I can let you know where you will stand in the calendar if you choose to commission a painting. In a few moments, I'll be publishing photos of a couple of cow paintings I recently finished, one of which is a "redo" of one I did a couple of years ago which I just wasn't completely happy with. Now I like it.